Denver Four Seasons Hotel & Private Residences (Part 2)

[Giovoni]

Originally Posted by 5280

I love that this thread has already become a battleground over capitalism. Wait til people start posting photos of the luxurious, gilded interior of this building and discussing how there's a full-time dog manicurist available for residents.

But my dog deserves a manicure because he works a lot harder than other dogs!

[Fritzdude]

Originally Posted by Fidel Castrobot

Uh.... The difference being that a market, unlike a government, doesn't create laws. Its much harder or impossible to fight a corrupt government if you rely on it for everything in life..Maybe you should take a look at history and report back to me on what you find regarding how previous attempts at socialism have worked out.

I think there is a lot of confusion in the understanding of a capitalist system vs a socialist system. Just for reference, our country continually works in the middle as a hybrid model since the gov't makes the laws, creates many of the standards, and does a bunch of regulating and restricting of markets. But regardless, I'm all for gov't acting out in the best interest of it's representatives... since that's part of the reason why we elect them.

For instance, I'd like to see the city of Denver push for recruiting specific development of essential services in the city, such as grocery outlets, housing, retail districts, schooling options, etc... They should do this with the intention of bringing greater density and vibrancy to the city, which should ultimately create a better environment for a multitude of live/work opportunities, which then push up demand and create more valuable property rates - and thus higher revenue tax streams. To get the ball rolling, they can entice developers with discounted property taxes and hold their hand through the stages of EIS/permits/zoning challenges that can make development in the city problematic. In turn, make it easy on these guys to choose Denver over some other place and the tax abatements are seen as an "investment" rather than a gov't form of subsidation.

I guess this could be contsrued as creeping socialism, but I still think it makes good sense.

[Pizzuti]

Originally Posted by Fidel Castrobot

Uh.... The difference being that a market, unlike a government, doesn't create laws. Its much harder or impossible to fight a corrupt government if you rely on it for everything in life..Maybe you should take a look at history and report back to me on what you find regarding how previous attempts at socialism have worked out.

OK, I'm really going to try harder to end this tangent and not directly list succesfull social programs in thriving economies in the United Kingdom, in France, in Denmark, Norway, Canada, hell, even in New York City and San Francisco and Denver.

But instead, I'll just point out what a shifty definition of "socialism" you guys have.

I mentioned a balance between free-market and capitalism (which every single nation on Earth has, but puts the pin in a different place), and you point out (or rather imply) that socialism in the past has been a failure.

I'm sure you're thinking of the Soviet Union, communist China, Vietnam, North Korea and all the totalitarian or dysfunctional systems that nobody in the free world has any will or desire to replicate.

So when we talk about a decent, reasonable social program that could make life better for people - say, free clinics in urban areas for people in high-risk groups to get tested for HIV to slow the spread of the disease - say, affordable housing programs (that are proven to lower crime, but, in any case, greatly benefit the people being housed by them) - say, shifting to public mass transit systems away from roads and automobiles - say, zoning laws and ordinances to build a more cohesive, livable city - we have to deal with this SOCIALISM moniker and a brick wall and are accused of hating wealth or markets.

And suddenly we are somehow cornered into defending Mao and Stalin.

Yours is a shifty binary of socialism vs. capitalism, based on an ideology of individualism and self-sufficiency that is too utopian to function in the real world, just as total communalism is too utopian to function in the free world.

Both extremes - being anti-capitalist, or anti-government, are stupid, because they preclude the possibility of even looking at potentially good ideas because of which side they'd fall on. Sometimes deregulation is good. Sometimes regulation is good. It depends on the circumstances.

But here's where I think a lot of us here on these forums get annoyed. Because though there are anti-socialists here, there are no anti-capitalists here. Absolutely no one is saying "abolish the free market and private property." Nor is anyone saying "damn there are too many private projects going on Downtown, the Four Seasons and Spire and Tabor and Bell Tower should be cancelled because they are private!" We might critique their nuances, but celebrate the success of the project.

But then we hear a lot of general, vague attacks on our own ideas because they qualify as "programs." So every time we come up with some proposal or idea that involves government, we have to deal with OMG U SOCIALIST! and then get suckered into some tangental debate about the merits of the free market.

Programs like affordable housing, public transportation, and zoning laws DO pertain absolutely to the topics on this forum. SOCIALISM IS BAD probably doesn't. And I admit, we do get suckered in. And I admit that there are other occasions in life, or political cycles, in which the mixed-economists are the ones being a bit more ideological.

But ultimately, we're coming up with ideas, and then the anti-socialists are spouting off ideology, based on vague, ill-fitting analogies. It's ideas vs. ideology; ideology is the idea-killer. I don't think we are the ones being idological.

[The Dirt]

Thank you for articulating exactly what I was thinking, Pizzuti! You too, Fritz. Maybe tomorrow we can all enjoy some photos of this wonderful structure, and enjoy some good old fashioned discussion without somebody poisoning the well of intelligent discourse.

[Giovoni]

Originally Posted by Ilsaz

And Giovoni, I'm sorry, but I have no idea what your post had to do with what I was talking about. I will concede that under socialism people can be lazy and lose their incentive to do hard work. It's not a perfect system at all, as evidenced by the mountain of failures. But you are creating a straw man if you think I would dare advocate such a system where sloth could be rewarded. You should concede that capitalism is not a perfect system, either, and its focus on short-term profits have led to the exploitation of workers and limited natural resources.

Peace,
M.

Yes of course it's a straw man.. but so was this:

"You've got to be kidding me if you think that the majority of the wealthy got there through hard HONEST work. These are the people that squash entrepreneurialism and innovation, and they get bonuses and hefty severance packages for it. I see it every day."

You have several people on this board, MD's, land developers, etc who are working HARD to become wealthy someday. What reaction do you expect from me when I'm lumped in with those that couldn't possibly be wealthy from hard honest work? If some or all of us succeed are we no longer welcome at forum meets because now just because we have money we're evil? And I'll grant you that you didn't say that.. but the thread of the argument started there and I wanted to respond to it.

Unfettered capitalism is seriously, seriously flawed. No one could possibly think otherwise (except for certain lazy/stupid/poor or lazy/stupid/rich) from watching the US and what's happened in the last decade.

I'm actually WAY more liberal than my posts here sometimes reflect. But I observe that a lot of people forget that safety net type programs and programs that were modeled after good socialist European models (Social Security, medicare/medicaide ala Bismark in Germany in the early 20th Century for example, welfare also) are not supposed to be used indeffinitely by certain populations. They aren't supposed to be used forever once ONE thing goes wrong. Nor are they supposed to be used by people who do nothing at all to deserve to keep a job and there are legion of these people.

I would be perfectly willing to pay more in taxes for social programs to be improved, I'd love to see mental health centers that Reagan extinguished brought back, for example. That would go a good way toward helping with all cities' homeless problem. However, I'd be willing to pay more because for some reason I was born with intelligence that most people don't have and I've worked hard to develop it and use it to make a good life for myself. I'd be willing to pay more because part of having success is having the opportunity to do good and gov't can do good in many many cases. I'd be willing to pay more because in many cases it's just the right thing to do.

I DON'T want to pay more because I'm a dishonest rapscallion who works to destroy entrepenuerism and innovation, sneering while the poor rot underneath me. I don't need to pay more as a punitive correction that will need to be made when I (hopefully) become successful. When some of my fellow liberals suggest that kind of general nonsense about money and having money it fosters (completely appropriate) resentment that makes it nearly impossible to improve or augment programs.

[Octavian]

I am not an expert in this field, but because Pizzuti believes this is a debate between "ideas vs. ideology," here are some free market ideas pertaining to cities and infrastructure. Please note that there is often a difference between market based approaches and what business or the Republican Party support.

-Eliminate the parking requirement to reduce construction costs and promote housing affordability.

-Eliminate the affordable housing requirement to reduce construction costs and promote housing affordability.

-Streamline the approval and permitting process (and reduce permitting fees) to reduce development costs and promote housing affordability. Ensure that property rights remain with the owners. If Mr. Geller builds his tower, it will be in spite of the current system.

-Increase the use of private contracts for RTD's bus and light rail operations. Cal Marsella says this saves RTD money and leaves RTD less vulnerable to strike.

-Maintain a low tax environment at the state level. Realize that there is a tradeoff between redistributing the pie and growing it. I don't doubt that taxing buyers at the Four Seasons would reduce income inequality, but I'd rather have a wealth generator like the Four Seasons.

-At the federal level, eliminate Davis-Bacon, the law that requires projects receiving federal dollars to pay union wages, reducing taxpayer expense while increasing the volume of such projects.

-Finance new road construction with user fees and institute congestion pricing. E-470 is a good model, built without taxpayer expense.

-Congestion pricing at airports. Though this would provide a revenue source for capital improvements at congested facilities, it is opposed by Democrats.

-Privatize the air traffic control system or turn it into a non-profit financed by user fees. Our system is antiquated. Why leave the air traffic control system at the mercy of the annual Congressional appropriations process? Canada uses a system like this, and Canadian planes do not fall from the sky.

[drifting sun]

I've been noticing that the Four Seasons already looks spectacular in the early evening with the setting sun glimmering off of its exterior cladding (the parts that are finished). I don't suppose that anyone here with a decent camera (I've only got an Olympus point-and-shoot) has been snapping some twilight pics of our growing skyline?

[Pizzuti]

Octavian I would certainly be able to discuss some of those proposals. And where I oppose them, you won't hear me saying "OMG THAT'S UNFETTERED CAPITALISM" or "THAT REPRESENTS THE PRIVATIZATION OF A PUBLIC PROCESS!!!!!!"

I'd certainly be up to discuss eliminating the parking requirements, though a better compromise would be simply reducing them in certain circumstances. I'd absolutely support "streamlining the approval and permitting process" though I don't know what you're talking about referring to Bell Tower; the project WAS approved under the current system. I'd support private contracts under RTD if it made public transportation more economical without a cost to the operators' living wages. I'd absolutely support charging tolls to pay for all new highways! And I don't know enough about the air traffic control system, but I'm not against the idea off the bat.

There are a few of those proposals I would oppose, since they are, in essence, eliminations of working programs for peculiar reasons. For example, the convoluted "Eliminate the affordable housing requirement to reduce construction costs and promote housing affordability" (that's like saying reduce the size of the police force to catch more criminals) doesn't seem to be resulting from an actual desire to reduce housing prices, it seems to be resulting from a desire to free up the market under the belief that all sorts of good things come of it (a.k.a. free market ideology). But if somebody actually presented an unbiased (meaning not released by the Heritage Foundation), solid, irrefutable study that shows that affordable housing requirements increase housing prices, then I would support the change, absolutely. I don't want the affordable housing requirement out of desire to take control away from developers, I want the requirement so that housing becomes affordable.

[Pizzuti]

And as for your parking comment... I even specifically suggested using free-market principles when it comes to providing parking Downtown, to encourage people to use transit, several hours before you made your post.

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showpost.php?p=4303200&postcount=1115

[Octavian]

Originally Posted by Pizzuti

There are a few of those proposals I would oppose, since they are, in essence, eliminations of working programs for peculiar reasons. For example, the convoluted "Eliminate the affordable housing requirement to reduce construction costs and promote housing affordability" (that's like saying reduce the size of the police force to catch more criminals) doesn't seem to be resulting from an actual desire to reduce housing prices, it seems to be resulting from a desire to free up the market under the belief that all sorts of good things come of it (a.k.a. free market ideology). But if somebody actually presented an unbiased (meaning not released by the Heritage Foundation), solid, irrefutable study that shows that affordable housing requirements increase housing prices, then I would support the change, absolutely. I don't want the affordable housing requirement out of desire to take control away from developers, I want the requirement so that housing becomes affordable.

In this case, Heritage Foundation has it 100% right. But since you need your information from a trusted liberal, I give you Paul Krugman. Here's Megan McArdle. Ryan Advent. Here is the WSJ. The Library of Economics and Liberty. For others who might be interested, Cato.

The bottom line (page 85):

inclusionary zoning programs represent a tax on new market-rate development, so some market units that would have been delivered in the absence of the tax are not delivered. Hence, the net contribution of these programs in terms of new housing supply is less than the number of “affordable” units delivered. In sum, one cannot expect a policy that effectively taxes developers to produce enough new housing to solve any significant affordability problem.

Finally, an excellent article from New York Magazine on urban regulation more generally.

[Giovoni]

Why do you need a study to say that redistributing the cost of below market rate units raises the costs of other units? You learned that math in 8th grade. The argument is whether or not doing that is better for the community in the long run.

I'm not even sure what I'd support. If we repealed the inclusionary housing requirement and could prove that a lot more downtown units would be built at market rate, that would increase the supply of affordable housing in the long run as new buildings are built and the older buildings lose their luster. This would take decades, not years though.

If we keep building transit and want it to be successful in the long run Denver HAS to eliminate parking requirements. If transit is available and buildings can be built close with virtually no parking the city would densify VERY quickly I would wager. Letting new buildings downtown be required to house cars undermines new commitments to transit and downtown living. To paraphrase Einstein 'you can't simultaneously prevent and prepare for transit use'.

[mojiferous]

We really need some more action on the construction front... Even side threads are becoming dragged down by off-topic debate. Remember when the Webb building and the Hyatt were going up and no one could shut up about how amazing it was to have construction going on in Denver? Now we've got multiple buildings under construction and we're arguing about everything except for the color of each other's shoes.

p.s. If you wear white shoes you require mental help, as evidenced by this banana

[bcp]

while i respect einstein, giovani is really getting there...well put.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by Giovoni

Yes of course it's a straw man.. but so was this:

"You've got to be kidding me if you think that the majority of the wealthy got there through hard HONEST work. These are the people that squash entrepreneurialism and innovation, and they get bonuses and hefty severance packages for it. I see it every day."

You have several people on this board, MD's, land developers, etc who are working HARD to become wealthy someday. What reaction do you expect from me when I'm lumped in with those that couldn't possibly be wealthy from hard honest work? If some or all of us succeed are we no longer welcome at forum meets because now just because we have money we're evil? And I'll grant you that you didn't say that.. but the thread of the argument started there and I wanted to respond to it.

Unfettered capitalism is seriously, seriously flawed. No one could possibly think otherwise (except for certain lazy/stupid/poor or lazy/stupid/rich) from watching the US and what's happened in the last decade.

I'm actually WAY more liberal than my posts here sometimes reflect. But I observe that a lot of people forget that safety net type programs and programs that were modeled after good socialist European models (Social Security, medicare/medicaide ala Bismark in Germany in the early 20th Century for example, welfare also) are not supposed to be used indeffinitely by certain populations. They aren't supposed to be used forever once ONE thing goes wrong. Nor are they supposed to be used by people who do nothing at all to deserve to keep a job and there are legion of these people.

I would be perfectly willing to pay more in taxes for social programs to be improved, I'd love to see mental health centers that Reagan extinguished brought back, for example. That would go a good way toward helping with all cities' homeless problem. However, I'd be willing to pay more because for some reason I was born with intelligence that most people don't have and I've worked hard to develop it and use it to make a good life for myself. I'd be willing to pay more because part of having success is having the opportunity to do good and gov't can do good in many many cases. I'd be willing to pay more because in many cases it's just the right thing to do.

I DON'T want to pay more because I'm a dishonest rapscallion who works to destroy entrepenuerism and innovation, sneering while the poor rot underneath me. I don't need to pay more as a punitive correction that will need to be made when I (hopefully) become successful. When some of my fellow liberals suggest that kind of general nonsense about money and having money it fosters (completely appropriate) resentment that makes it nearly impossible to improve or augment programs.

I am truly sorry if you took offense to my comment, but I think that I was being unclear. My statement was in response to the notion that being rich equates to being hard working/successful/honest/etc. while poor equates to the exact opposite. My experience with many wealthy people in the corporate world is that they are merely riding the coattails of someone else's hard work. I never said nor implied that ALL wealthy people are evil capitalists bastards or something. These are the same people that complain about the government "unfairly" taxing them to fund welfare queens. My wife is in the medical field as well, and I think she earns every penny that she makes. So believe me, I'm not trying to suggest that wanting to make a lot of money is inherently evil and everyone should join a commune. I believe that there are many entrepreneurs, innovators, small business owners, and people in demanding professions that deserve their wealth, and I believe that some are being unfairly over-taxed. However, the notion that your pay rate equates 1:1 to your work ethic is silly.

At the same time, if a person of middle income happens to get seriously ill and needs chemo or a transplant, it's a very quick fall to the bottom of the economic ladder. Does that mean that they're inherently lazy or worthless, because they're poor and asking for a handout? The argument didn't start with my comment.

[DENrising]

Originally Posted by drifting sun

I've been noticing that the Four Seasons already looks spectacular in the early evening with the setting sun glimmering off of its exterior cladding (the parts that are finished). I don't suppose that anyone here with a decent camera (I've only got an Olympus point-and-shoot) has been snapping some twilight pics of our growing skyline?

I'll be downtown most of next week, will definitely try to snap some shots, I'll try to post them here. Hope for some nice weather, don't want to dodge the rain, but I'm going to make the rounds downtown, so stay tuned!!

[Miu]

Originally Posted by Giovoni

I'm actually WAY more liberal than my posts here sometimes reflect. But I observe that a lot of people forget that safety net type programs and programs that were modeled after good socialist European models (Social Security, medicare/medicaide ala Bismark in Germany in the early 20th Century for example, welfare also) are not supposed to be used indeffinitely by certain populations.

Bismarck would turn in his grave if he read that you called him a socialist.

[Pizzuti]

Originally Posted by Octavian

In this case, Heritage Foundation has it 100% right. But since you need your information from a trusted liberal, I give you Paul Krugman. Here's Megan McArdle. Ryan Advent. Here is the WSJ. The Library of Economics and Liberty. For others who might be interested, Cato.

The bottom line (page 85):




Finally, an excellent article from New York Magazine on urban regulation more generally.

The links you gave me were about rent control. That doesn't work as a comparison. You can't show me a criticism of one policy to show proof that liberals back repealing another. Rent control is a cap on rent, but allowing developers to price units however they want so long as they provide some smaller units whose market price would make them affordable to middle or low-income people is a great compromise.

To lay out some of what I'm talking about... the kind of statement that begins with "so and so has it 100% correct" is generally not the kind of statement that turns out to be useful information. Policies have upsides and downsides, and no matter how obviously one may outweigh the other, it never reaches 100%. I read that as "I am 100% not listening to any counterargument or nuance."

Now, as for Denver's ordinance, which may be accused of raising the "market rate" of a development because the developer is forced to supply affordable units... we are talking about different things when we discuss "market rate" and when we discuss the presence of affordable units.

If the ordinance takes a 100 condos that would be priced at $350,000 and unintentionally increases their cost to $360,000, but in the process leads to 10 rental units priced at $600 a month, I think that's a fair trade. It's like a user tax (which libertarians and conservatives tend to support) on the product of relatively comfortable condos Downtown, to pay for affordable housing. "Market rate" is not the same as "affordability;" the increase of 10K to the expensive unit does not make them prohibitive to their tenants, but the lower-priced amount was already prohibitive to most people in the first place.

Now, if you could come back and say that by forcing developers to provide affordable units, the whole of condos and apartments increase in price so much as to become prohibitive to a number of people that would amount to more than 10% of the population, then you could say that the people it excludes outweigh the people it brings in.

Then again, there's the argument that the neighborhood being taken over by gentrification was a low-income neighborhood that had been housing a certain community for decades or longer, and the ordinance has an ameliorative effect of allowing some of those previous residents to remain - in which case that moral issue outweighs the possibility that it slightly raises prices for upper-middle-class residents.

Still, I don't think that anyone could ever show that the amount that new housing prices that are not targeted to low-income residents would decrease so much as to let droves of new people in if the ordinance were repealed. But having just 10% of the units classify as "affordable" does let a lot of new people in.

[Octavian]

Originally Posted by Pizzuti

No... they're saying it raises the "market rate," not that it reduces affordability, because it doesn't specify whether or not it raises it HIGHER than the amount of low-income-accessible units it delivers to the market.

If the ordinance takes a 100 condos that would be priced at $350,000 and increases their cost to $360,000, but in the process leads to 10 rental units priced at $600 a month, I think that's a fair trade. "Market rate" is not the same as "affordability;" the increase of 10K to the expensive unit does not make them prohibitive, but the lower-priced amount was already prohibitive in the first place.

I'm gonna go ahead and agree with the Nobel Prize winning economist on this issue, who is against these regulations.

More from Glaeser:

Maximum rent ceilings, a classic price control, used to be the most prominent housing market regulation. But the destructive consequences of this policy for the broader housing market are now well understood. Most importantly, this policy weakens incentives for new supply, so it cannot help to solve an affordability crisis in which prices are well above production costs. Rent control is also an incredibly inefficient way to redistribute resources to the poor for housing consumption. Fortunately, rent controls presently exist in cities in only four states, and the new control regimes tend to be milder than the WWII-era schemes. We do not anticipate a widespread return to this policy, although a recent proposal in Boston to enact collective rent bargaining could be more pernicious in its consequences than even New York City’s old-style control regime.

Quality and quantity restrictions have replaced price controls in the arsenal of housing regulation. Building codes have become more burdensome, and the data indicate that they could account for up to a 10 percent increase in house prices. But a 10 percent price increase does not explain the bulk of the very large increases in house prices observed in many U.S. markets. The expansion of land-use controls and regulations is a much greater influence in causing housing prices to rise. This type of regulation has proliferated in scale and complexity, and analyses of the Boston area and the new Wharton index strongly suggest that quantity and quality controls significantly contribute to high house prices in markets where those values are well above construction costs.

We see local land-use restrictions as something of a government-created market failure. In principle, these rules could efficiently internalize the social costs of development (e.g., pollution, crowding), but there is very little reason to think that they actually do so. Instead, it seems that heterogeneity in these policies across space reflects local politics more than anything else; and at least in some areas, the restrictions seem far too onerous relative to what is needed to compensate residents for the added social costs of new development. These local rules have had a massive impact on the affordability of American housing. If we are to make housing more affordable, then checking these local rules seems like the first order of business.

Inclusionary zoning schemes have been implemented in some markets in hopes of generating more “affordable” housing, where “affordable” implies valuations below those presently existing in the market. If properly designed, these schemes can generate some additional housing, but they will not solve the underlying affordability problem in high-cost housing markets. The reason is that they essentially tax market-rate development, which fundamentally limits the supply-generating capacity of the program.

[Pizzuti]

And I'm gonna go ahead and say what what I'm talking about isn't the same thing as what you're talking about.

If you and I were discussing climate change, and I came in with some sort of analysis supporting same-sex marriage, an entirely different issue, and saying it proves my point about climate change, wouldn't you be a little annoyed?

I direct your attention to: "Fortunately, rent controls presently exist in cities in only four states, and the new control regimes tend to be milder than the WWII-era schemes."

Do you suppose he's talking about Colorado? No, we're not on that list. That's what most of the links you provided were discussing; an NYC-style rent control. I saw NYC and San Francisco, nothing of Denver, and here is Paul Krugman confirming that those programs are rare and limited to four states, which are presumably states that contain cities on the scale of NYC and San Francisco (Probably Illinois and Massachusetts, unless he counts D.C. as a state in this case.)

Only in Paul Krugman's final paragraph does he address, vaguely, the kind of ordinance we see in Denver - zoning schemes designed to create affordable housing, and a bit of analysis on whether or not they actually create affordable housing. He goes on to say that if they are good programs they do add affordable housing to he market, though they do not answer the "underlying" problem as a whole because they somewhat limit the markets capacity to supply large quantities of housing.

Hell, I'll take that, that's the most we had hoped for. We're solving part of the problem though not the whole thing.

So can you trust Paul Krugman, since he has proved himself to not come down 100% on the liberal side, to not be an ideologue, to be friendly to capitalism and market principles - but has voiced the opinion that inclusionary zoning is a partial solution to the problem of housing affordability in urban areas?


Oh and hey - since you indicated it - can I count on your support for all of Paul Krugman's other proposals or ideas?

[Strange Meat]

Originally Posted by Giovoni

You have several people on this board, MD's, land developers, etc who are working HARD to become wealthy someday. What reaction do you expect from me when I'm lumped in with those that couldn't possibly be wealthy from hard honest work? If some or all of us succeed are we no longer welcome at forum meets because now just because we have money we're evil? And I'll grant you that you didn't say that.. but the thread of the argument started there and I wanted to respond to it.

I think that the problem is, well, I'll try and break it down as I see it.

You have a lot of people making a LOT of money simply because they HAVE money. There is nothing wrong with having money, but, it's a little bit grating when you have wealthy people who seem to think that opportunity is equal across the board and that those without money are either not equally abled or are just lazy. What's worse, are those who have money and view those with less than them as being not as good as them, as people. Arrogance and condescendence are not positive traits, IMO.

I think that the view of people with money varies with their profession. Are you a MD? A research scientist? Someone who tries to make the world a better place and come up with solutions, or, are you in a field viewed is greedy, predatory, and of no real use to humanity, etc. Ya know?

Personal anecdote would be how I foresee myself doing well for myself, I'm too intelligent, once I make the opportunity for myself, I'm gonna do well. I'm just still in college, and I'm in my mid 20s. I've run into people my age who have dismissed me because I'm still going through the process. They assume I'm lazy, etc, and have passed me off as not as good as them (even though they only have a business management degree it'd typically seem... ), and most of them, shockingly enough, came from middle/upper middle class backgrounds and never had a financial worry in their life. It's like, you know, sorry I had a poor family and ended up in Iraq to pay for school. Guess I'm just not up to snuff with you...

And of course, when you usually see those with money being the most stingy, etc...

It'd really be wonderful if Lagom applied out here...